Child
by Az The Dragon
Summary: Virus are nasty things. Especially if they tend to change both a navi's body and its personality. What would happen if one of these viruses infected Forte?


**A/N:** This is my end of the trade with kirby-4-ever over at Deviantart. She asked something about with a baby Forte in it, and this came out. I tried to keep Forte as in-character as I could, yet give him a child-like personality. Hopefully it came out alright.

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Child

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Netto would have gotten a full night of rest if a blip coming from his PET didn't wake him up. Normally he would have rolled on his other side, ignored the sound and returned to the land of dreams, but when muted voices reached his ears, his drowsy mind half recalled why this was not going to be neither normal, nor peaceful.

He spent the next few seconds trying to come up with a valid excuse to not get up, but when nothing came to mind, he gave up and sat on the edge of his bed. He glared at the blue PET resting on his desk with all the unhappiness and frustration a sleep deprived boy his age could muster.

"Rockman," he whined, voice low and heavy with tiredness. "Can't you keep him quiet? At least for tonight?"

The screen of the PET turned on, showering the room in blue light, and Rockman gave an apologetic smile to his operator. "Sorry, Netto-kun," he said, trying to ward off something with his hand. He was going to add something else regarding the issue, but he was interrupted when a blow to his shin made him crouch with a yelp of surprise.

"Fight me, Rockman!"

Netto sighed loudly as he stood up and reached the desk to sit on the chair. "I hope dad can find a solution to this tomorrow," he muttered as he grabbed the PET and stared at the screen. "At least when normal, he's not this annoying…"

Suddenly, a face that was not Rockman's appeared on the monitor and made Netto nearly fall out of the chair. Forte was not pleased to have been called annoying, but because of his current conditions, his angered face was far from being scary. "I am _not_ annoying, human!"

No one knew how he had been infected, just that early that morning Forte had appeared looking like a four year old child and demanded a fight with his strongest rival. When Rockman had refused, the black navi had started to tag after him with the intention of not leaving without a fight. This included pestering him during the night, too.

Netto watched as Rockman pried the childfied navi off the screen and held him away from it. "Why don't you just give him what he wants?" he asked, observing how Forte was trying to slip away from his rival's arms. "At least then he'll stop this nonsense…"

Rockman frowned at his operator, not sure what to do. Forte might have reverted to a child, but his personality hadn't changed too much. Even if more petulant and demanding than usual, he still retained his anger, hate and obsession. "I don't know, Netto-kun. You know Forte, once he gets into something, he won't stop until he's satisfied," he paused to look down at the struggling navi for a moment. "Starting a fight might make things worse…"

Unable to force Rockman into a fight with his mere presence like he always did in the past, Forte glared up at the blue navi. "What? You scared to fight me?" he asked with a voice that matched his size. "Scared you can't last a second against me?"

A muted chuckled came from outside the PET, and the two navis turned around to see that Netto was trying hard to not laugh and was failing miserably. He was turned to the side, hunched over and with one hand covering his mouth while the other held his stomach. His eyes were squeezed shut and there were a few tears coming out of them for the effort to not burst into loud laughs and wake up his parents.

Thinking that Forte's reaction to the insult of being laughed at would be a violent outburst, Rockman tightened his hold onto the resized black navi. "Netto-kun," he called with urgency. Forte had stopped struggling, but he could feel his frame shake in anger. "I don't think you should do that…"

"S-sorry…" Netto barely managed to say between repressed laughs. He then started to gesticulate in the air with one hand while the other remained on his stomach. "It's just… his face… too much to handle…"

Forte, ego already ruined by the whole ordeal of being infected by a virus and ending up as a small child, felt terrible. And he detested being carried around like a doll. He slumped against Rockman's arm and stared at the cybernetic ground, wishing it would melt and engulf him into the sweet darkness of the Undernet.

"I want to go home…" he muttered to himself just before an inexplicable, sudden urge engulfed his entire frame. Unable to resist, he threw his head backwards and started to bawl as loudly as he could. "I _hate_ you!"

And that made Netto break into loud laughs and fall from the chair.


End file.
